It is scary to think that Minister Murray Watt could be so deliberately obtuse about the illicit tobacco problem | Caleb Bond

Our streets are filled with shady tobacconists — but when it comes to the government’s punishing tobacco duty, Environment Minister Murray Watt just can’t make the connection, writes Caleb Bond.

Every now and then a politician says something that makes you wonder whether they inhabit the same planet as the rest of us.

Men are from Mars, women are from Venus and politicians are from… Uranus.

Sometimes they say things that are so obviously untrue and nonsensical that if even a seven-year-old said it you’d be worried they were struggling at school.

And so it was this week at the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee, where they’re conducting an inquiry into the scourge that is illicit tobacco.

Our main streets are littered with dodgy tobacconists – they seem to be just about the only growth businesses at the moment.

Tobacco industry data shows that the illicit market currently makes up about 50 per cent of cigarette sales and is estimated to be as much as 80 per cent next year. Source: ABF

Many of these shops are being firebombed as crime gangs, predominantly Middle Eastern, battle to gain control of the illegal cigarette market.

That’s destroying the livelihoods of innocent businessmen and women and driving up insurance premiums for apartments and other shops that happen to be in the same building as a tobacconist.

Not to mention that at least five people have been killed in the tobacco turf wars, including an innocent Melbourne woman who was staying in a house that was wrongly firebombed.

So – what might have caused all of this?

You and I probably have an idea, but have a go at this exchange between One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts and Environment Minister Murray Watt at the Senate inquiry this week.

Mr Roberts: “Do you consider the government’s very high tobacco duty is the reason otherwise law-abiding citizens are prepared to buy illegal tobacco for generally a third of the legal price?”

Mr Watt: “No.”

Mr Roberts: “Any reasons?”

Mr Watt: “Ah, there’s absolutely no evidence to suggest that argument.”

Mr Roberts, while chuckling: “You’re joking?”

Mr Watt: “No.”

Mr Roberts, still chuckling: “OK.”

Keep in mind that Mr Watt maintained a straight, steely face the whole time.

Here I was thinking that the reason people were buying $10 or $15 illegal packets of cigarettes was because they were cheaper than the $40 or $50 legal packets – most of which is made up of tax.

Silly me, I should have known there was absolutely no evidence that the extortionate cost of a packet of darts, caused by tax, had anything to do with people preferring to buy the cheaper, tax-free illegal ones.

An illicit tobacco bust with $1 million worth of product seized at a single store. Picture: Keryn Stevens.

It must just be that otherwise law-abiding citizens have, en masse, decided that they’d really like to make donations to Middle Eastern crime gangs.

I mean, there’s no other possible explanation.

Tobacco industry data shows that the illicit market currently makes up about 50 per cent of cigarette sales and is estimated to be as much as 80 per cent next year.

But it has nothing to do with the cost and the tax that keeps driving that cost up and up!

Mr Watt offered no other explanation for this explosion of the illegal cigarette market but, whatever it is, I’d really like to hear it.

Perhaps he should confer with his Labor colleague, NSW Premier Chris Minns, who says the tobacco tax is driving people to illegal durries.

It is scary to think that a senior minister could be so deliberately obtuse about what is now one of this country’s biggest societal and criminal problems.

Prevention is better than cure but prevention requires understanding the cause.

They just don’t want to admit that they got it wrong and, in doing so, handed a gift to organised criminals on a silver platter.